[La Règle du Jeu] is based on the idea of man as a social being, to whom conventions are both irksome and necessary. Polite exchanges will embody our thought only up to a point; in the end the feelings will not be contained within these bounds and it is a matter of chance, or fate, whether the irruption of passion will end well or badly. The social conventions are not free or generous enough to allow for the full extension of a normal feeling person, so that, at any moment, bursts of emotion may occur. Society itself channels these to some extent in occasions of organized license, but not everyone is amenable to the dictates of society, and occasionally passion breaks loose and proves destructive.

The shoot is such an occasion; it is a crucial sequence, and is, in a sense, the key image of the film...